


Secret Admirer

by KodaOfHeart



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Anonymity, First Kiss, Fluff, Humanstuck, Identity Reveal, Love Confessions, M/M, One Shot, Secret Admirer, Trans Male Character, dave is uh all that because projection, heelys, karkat is a techie cause projection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 16:54:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24070144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KodaOfHeart/pseuds/KodaOfHeart
Summary: You find the first note in your locker on Monday morning.YOU LOOK NICE IN A SUIT. I WAS TOO MUCH OF A COWARD TO TELL YOU IN PERSON BUT I STILL THINK YOU SHOULD KNOW.It’s scribbled on a piece of notebook paper in all-caps using a gray marker. Your breath catches in your throat as your eyes skim over the words, and you quickly look up and around to see if anyone’s watching you. Barely anyone is even around and none of them are at all interested in you. All these kids are about to be late to first period, you included, but you couldn’t care less.Someone left an anonymous love letter in your locker.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas
Comments: 33
Kudos: 369





	1. You Look Nice In A Suit

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my self-indulgent one shot that I wrote in a day instead of working on any of my responsibilities!  
> I'm in the middle of my second read of Homestuck and bitches just want some nice fluff rather than the shit Hussie gave us in canon. It's me, I'm bitches. Let me have this.  
> If you leave a comment here or talk to me about it on Twitter @/KodaOfHeart I'll love you forever that's a promise! <3
> 
> Content warning: there is one sentence in this chapter which could count as a depiction of violence though it isn't very graphic in my opinion? It's about swords/strifing injuries and happens after the second note.

You find the first note in your locker on Monday morning.

YOU LOOK NICE IN A SUIT. I WAS TOO MUCH OF A COWARD TO TELL YOU IN PERSON BUT I STILL THINK YOU SHOULD KNOW.

It’s scribbled on a piece of notebook paper in all-caps using a gray marker. Your breath catches in your throat as your eyes skim over the words, and you quickly look up and around to see if anyone’s watching you. Barely anyone is even around and none of them are at all interested in you. All these kids are about to be late to first period, you included, but you couldn’t care less. _Someone left an anonymous love letter in your locker._

Okay, “love letter” is a big stretch there, let’s be honest. But still, it’s a really nice little note written by god-knows-who and slipped into your locker all cliche-like. You turn your attention back to the paper you’re white-knuckling and read that first sentence over and over and over. Six words is apparently all it takes to have heaven’s light surround you while a chorus of little naked angel babies sing a song of euphoria. A specific kind of euphoria.

You came out last summer right after school ended. Your brother took it well enough and helped you get a haircut and a binder and even onto testosterone shots, though it did make him up the difficulty on his strifes with you because he thinks you can handle it more as a guy, which you think is a little sexist but you’d never tell him that. You came out kind of quietly online, just changing the name on your social media profiles, deleting old ironic selfies and replacing them with new ones, shit like that. You’re not the type of guy to make a big coming out post or put the trans flag around your profile picture. You just wanted people to know enough to respect it and not ask any questions. Though soon enough, the questions started flooding in about the changes. You lost some friends but you also became closer with some of your friends and family members who accepted you whole-heartedly. Even your dumbass friend John is kinda confused but he’s got the spirit and doesn’t use your deadname anymore. You’re happy with how smooth everything went for the most part.

Though you were still nervous as all hell when you showed up to Homecoming three days ago wearing your first suit. Your sister Rose helped you pick it out and her girlfriend Kanaya modified it a little for you. You had originally wanted a really stupid-looking outfit for ironic purposes, but settled for a more normal - if colorful - attire since you didn’t want to draw too much attention to your outfit. These first few months of school have been pretty rough with a few particular students making it their personal goal to give you hell and even a few teachers who constantly mess up your name and pronouns so that no matter how hard you pass all of your classmates have constant reminders of what you were born as… but you sucked it up and still went to the stupid dance for your friends. You obviously didn’t have a date because everyone who used to crush on you is now confused as all hell, and you’re honestly confused about your own sexuality, but you and your friends still had a great time as you pretended to be unseen by the rest of the school.

But now, staring at this note and reading it for the forty-third time, you think about how apparently you _were_ seen by at least one person. And that person apparently thinks you’re hot shit. You try to picture the scene: you and Rose standing off to the side watching with amused expressions as your other two friends dance their hearts out and look like cute idiots doing so, while someone across the gym gazes at you longingly and tries to work up the nerve to tell you that you look nice. Your brain struggles for a moment to imagine the person - boy? girl? enby? - before deciding to picture a pretty girl in an elegant ballgown that’s black with bright green gems and sequins, she has long black hair and round gl- okay stop you’re just picturing Jade. Maybe instead she’s in a soft pink dress and she's got brown hair braided with flowers in it as if she was straight out of a cottagecore Pinterest board. Or perhaps she's got platinum blonde hair like you, but its long and pulled up into a bun, and she's wearing a tiny silver dress that doesn't even reach her knees. Or-

A scowling teacher approaches you, snapping you out of your daydream, and in a hurry you crinkle up the note and shove it in your pocket so you can grab your books and head to class. In your rush you didn’t realize you grabbed your chemistry books even though you don’t have that until after lunch, so you spend all of AP Lit listening to music through the headphone hidden in your sleeve and thinking about that little letter.

You wonder who wrote it, if it’s someone you know, if it’s maybe one of your friends trying to prank you. Well, no, most of your friends are too wholesome for that, it’s more likely that if they wrote it they did it to give you an ego boost. But what if you somehow have a secret admirer? You know you’re good-looking but you also know you’re the only trans kid in this tiny school that’s smack dab in the middle of bible-belt Texas and that no one here would think of you that highly. Maybe that’s why this person is staying anonymous, for the sake of not getting bullied? _That would make sense_ , you figure even as your heart drops at the thought.

Rose confronts you after class about how you were paying attention even less so than you usually do, but you hold off on telling her the truth for now because you know there’d be a lot she’d want to discuss about it. So you instead wait until lunch time to show your friends the now-wrinkled note. As expected, Rose is intrigued and wants to devise a plan to figure out who wrote it, Jade is gushy and makes fun of you a little for having a secret admirer, and John suggests that you wrote it yourself ironically. When all was said and done and lunch ends, you’re no closer to finding out who wrote it besides narrowing it down to not being any of your three close friends. So you start making plans for finding the person if they decide to write you again. It seems unlikely, since according to the note there’s only one thing they wanted to say and they said it, but as you board the bus home you find yourself wishing to find another note for you tomorrow morning.

There isn’t. You’re weirdly disappointed to find your locker devoid of anonymous notes, but nevertheless spend the whole school day thinking about yesterday’s and talking about it more with your friends.

On Wednesday there’s still not another note. You don’t know why you’re expecting one to be there each time you open your locker, but you guess you just don’t want to live in suspense forever and never find out anything more about this person and what they think of you. Maybe it’s all just you being conceited and wanting the attention, or maybe you’re just a really lonely motherfucker. You give up hope of receiving any more anonymous love confessions.

Come Thursday morning, however, another folded note greets you as you open your locker. Your heart leaps into your throat when you see it and you almost tear it to get it open.

I GIVE YOU ONE TINY NOTE AND YOU SPEND THREE DAYS TALKING TO YOUR FRIENDS ABOUT NOTHING BUT THAT. IF YOU WEREN’T SO CUTE I’D FIND YOU UNBEARABLY ANNOYING.

You can’t help it, you break out into a smile when you read it. It’s the same handwriting with the same marker - you’d know, you’ve memorized every detail of the first note by now. You wonder how this mystery girl knows you’ve been talking about the note for three days straight, so you interrogate your friends again when you see them at lunch to see if any of them wrote it. But they all have pretty good alibis for not caring enough to pull a prank like this. So that means the girl must be sitting near you at lunch or class, but since your group sits somewhere different every day it could really be anybody.

You spend all day swooning like a pathetic loser over someone thinking you “cute”. You’re also racking your brain on how to find the identity of this person or even how you could communicate back. You devise some plans and scribble them into your notebook, eager to try them out. Your first plan is one of communication: at the end of the school day you leave a note in your locker for your secret admirer to see.

who are you? meet me at lunch today in D hall

You fold up your note and tape it so you’ll know if it’s been opened, and write “to whoever keeps leaving me notes” on the outside of it.

The next day, your note is exactly as you left it, unopened and everything. Plus there’s no new note. Your heart falls for a moment before you realize what a dumbass you are - obviously she just slips her notes through the slots on your locker and never actually opens it, duh. Nevertheless, you spend all of lunchtime in D hall half-expecting someone to come up to you and confess their love.

No one does.

Over the weekend you spend way too much time daydreaming about the author of the notes, wondering if you’ll receive any more, if maybe they’ll have clues to her identity. You picture every type of girl as the author: maybe she’s tiny and shy and doesn’t talk much, maybe she’s tall and popular and outgoing but for whatever reason won’t reveal herself to you.

You even spend so much time thinking about it you pay less attention during your strifing and end up failing to block an easily avoidable blow to the arm. The sword cuts in kinda deep and you end up patching yourself up as always while your brother avoids you in a show of disappointment. You kick yourself for letting your mind wander so much over two dumb notes and vow to not think about it again. That proves difficult when you find another note on Monday morning.

WHILE YOU LOOK LIKE A PRINCE YOU ACT MORE LIKE A KNIGHT. VERY ARROGANT AND FULL OF HIMSELF BUT COURAGEOUS AND STRONG REGARDLESS. DOES THAT SOUND TOO SAPPY? FUCK IT PROBABLY DOES. SORRY.

The last three sentences are added at the bottom like an afterthought, and you chuckle to yourself wondering why she’d apologize for that yet send it anyway. Your curiosity comes back full-force wondering who in the world would see you like this, like a cute, brave, strong knight who looks like a prince who wears suits well. Your gender euphoria as well as ego go through the roof and you hold your head up high the whole day.

The next day you get to school really early by taking your skateboard instead of the bus and you stand by your locker to wait for a potential new note to be delivered. No one approaches, and you’re left noteless for the day.

You figure that maybe your presence scared them off, so on Wednesday you get to school early but wait down the hall instead, keeping your eyes focused directly on your locker. No one approaches it and no note awaits you when you finally go open it.

On Thursday you just take the bus, figuring that she either knew you were watching or she’s stopped writing at least for a while, and either way you cherish your sleep too much to keep coming in early. Imagine the look on your face when you open your locker and are greeted with another note and you realize you might've caught the author in the act if you had decided _today_ to come in early.

IS YOUR ARM OKAY? WHICH BASTARD DID THAT TO YOU? I’LL KILL THEM.

You smile a little to yourself as you subconsciously rub the healing wound that you’ve been hiding under bandages and sleeves. It’s been more visible when you’re in your t-shirt for your track & field class, so you wonder if that’s where she saw it. It’s really sweet that she’s threatening your attacker, but you can’t help but think of what she’d say if she found out who actually did that to you. You don't like the thought of her finding that out.

On Friday when you receive no note, you wonder if there’s a pattern going on here. Your theory gets stronger when you receive a note on Monday.

I CANT STOP THINKING ABOUT YOU. ITS A LITTLE FUCKING PATHETIC ACTUALLY.

It’s another short one, but it gets your heart doing acrobatic fucking pirouettes anyway. You wonder how she’s capable of being so aggressive yet so sweet in her notes. You fold the note back up and slip it into your pocket to add to the collection you’re keeping in your room. You’re so glad to know that you’re not the only alone in having this person run through your mind all day. Plus now you know her favorite days of the week so now you can know when to expect letters.

That next Thursday you get to school so early you’re practically the first student in the building. But your lack of sleep was for naught when you see a note is already waiting for you despite how early you are, so you make up the zees in your classes instead.

SERIOUSLY, HELP ME UNDERSTAND WHY I’M SO ENAMORED BY SOMEONE WHO WOULD NEVER HAVE A CHANCE OF LIKING ME BACK? MAYBE THE UNIVERSE JUST LIKES TO TAUNT ME. DANGLE CUTE GUYS IN FRONT OF MY FACE, WAITING FOR ME TO REACH FOR THEM, THEN SNATCHING THEM AWAY AND LAUGHING AT ME FOR TRYING. SORRY FOR THE RAMBLE THERE.

You again wonder why she’d regret saying that and still send it anyway, but now you’re racking your brain trying to think why the hell you have “no chance of liking her back”. Does she think you’re out of her league? Is she older, younger? Does she think you wouldn’t date her because of her appearance or maybe some sort of disability? You honestly have no idea why she’d think this way.

When you aren’t asleep, you’re spending your class time devising plans to find out who's doing this.

The letters keep coming every Monday and Thursday like clockwork.

I'VE SEEN THE WAY YOU CAN DRAW WHEN YOU ACTUALLY TRY. IT'S REALLY FUCKING GOOD. WHY DO YOU STICK TO THE IRONIC SHITPOSTS WHEN YOU'RE GENUINELY REALLY TALENTED? I'LL NEVER UNDERSTAND.

You try installing a camera near your locker but end up caught by teachers and given lunch detention for a week.

HOPE YOUR WEEKEND WAS GOOD. MAYBE ONE OF THESE DAYS WE COULD HANG OUT. HA, LIKE THAT WOULD EVER HAPPEN.

Your cousin who’s good with robotics made you a pressure plate to put in your locker and it’ll alert your phone when something falls on it. You’re caught again by teachers and, once you explain that it isn’t a bomb, are given just another week of lunch detention.

YOU HAVEN’T BEEN AT LUNCH IN A WHILE, WHERE’D YOU GO? ARE YOU OKAY?

You start turning your attention towards making the communication two-way instead of just finding out who’s writing the notes.

I HEARD YOU GOT DETENTION AND ALSO WHAT GOT YOU IN TROUBLE IN THE FIRST PLACE. THAT’S FUCKING HILARIOUS. TALK ABOUT KARMA FOR TRYING TO INVADE MY PRIVACY AND EVADE MY ANONYMITY, ASSHOLE.

You put a sticky note that reads “who are you” on your locker at the end of the school day on Wednesday. You come to school early again the next day and find your note on the floor partially under the lockers with some shoe prints on it. You figure she didn't even see it.

I HOPE THAT LAST NOTE DIDN’T COME OFF TOO HARSH. YOU’RE STILL ATTRACTIVE AND SOMEHOW COOL IN A VERY UNCOOL WAY, I JUST THINK YOU’RE AN IDIOT FOR TRYING TO USE TECH TO FIND MY IDENTITY.

On Friday you put another note on your locker, this time reading “who are you? add me on pesterchum: turntechGodhead” taping it securely in place. That night you get a flurry of messages from a ton of different people on Pesterchum all of various levels of harassment and trolling. You end up disregarding all of them. On Monday you find the note ripped off with only bits of tape remaining in its place.

WHY ARE YOU SO HELLBENT ON KNOWING WHO I AM? CAN’T I HAVE A SECRET CRUSH IN PEACE?

It’s thrilling to have the fact that she has a crush on you be confirmed, but it makes the suspense of not knowing who she is even more unbearable.

ACTUALLY, IT’S DAWNED ON ME THAT MAYBE THIS WHOLE STUNT HAS COME OFF AS REALLY FUCKING CREEPY, AND YOU MIGHT BE UNCOMFORTABLE BECAUSE OF IT. I CAN ASK BUT HAVE NO WAY OF GETTING AN ANSWER. I JUST HOPE YOU AREN’T WEIRDED OUT.

_No_ , you want to shout at the letter, _I’m not uncomfortable! Don’t stop, it’s not weird!_ Well, okay it is weird but not in a bad way. It’s just cliche and sort of cute and romantic.

On Monday, to your horror, there’s no letter from your secret admirer. You search all over your locker but find no note. You spent the whole day wondering what happened, if maybe she got sick or didn’t have time or got caught or someone stole it out of your locker or or… you don’t want to face the possibility that she stopped because she thinks you’re uncomfortable. Not only is the routine confidence boost really nice, but this is the coolest and most exciting thing to happen to you during school, and also if you never find out who wrote these you might just explode under the suspense like those videos of people who put rubber bands on watermelons until they burst. That’s you, the watermelon, and each day you don’t know who this girl is, is another rubber band.

The next Thursday, you hold your breath before opening your locker, praying to any god out there that this chick hasn’t left you alone. You swing open your locker and breathe the biggest sigh of relief as you see the newest folded note. When you open it up and see the longest letter yet, another small paper flutters out onto the floor. You’re quick to pick it up and find two stickers: a red circle and a green circle.

I SAW YOU SEARCHING FOR A NOTE ON MONDAY. MAYBE I’M JUST HOPEFUL THOUGH. BUT I DID MANAGE TO USE MY LAST REMAINING BRAIN CELL TO THINK OF A WAY TO ASK AND GET AN ANSWER. SO I INCLUDED STICKERS IN THIS LETTER THAT MY OBNOXIOUS AF BROTHER USES TO COLOR-CODE GODDAMN EVERYTHING. IF YOU WANT ME TO STOP WRITING THESE, PUT THE RED DOT ON YOUR LOCKER. IF FOR WHATEVER REASON YOU WANT MORE EMBARRASSING LOVE CONFESSIONS DROPPED IN YOUR LOCKER BIWEEKLY, PUT THE GREEN DOT ON. IF YOU DON’T CARE, DON’T PUT EITHER I GUESS. AND IF YOU PUT BOTH, FIRST OF ALL FUCK YOU, SECONDLY I’LL STOP.

You look at the stickers. A part of you wants to play it cool and put neither, look uninterested and nonchalant. But not only would that contradict your various methods of catching this person but you’re also dying to get more notes and don’t want to risk them not writing any more. You’re also excited about this invited method of communication with the admirer, so you pull out your red pen and prepare to make the most of the situation by writing something on the green dot for her. But the thing is so tiny, what could you even say?

You could attempt another “who are you” really small, but not only would it be hardly readable but you’ve tried that question enough times. You want to express how you aren’t uncomfortable at all, how you’re flattered, how nice it’s been getting these notes twice a week. You want to say how you’re dying to know who’s writing them, to meet the mystery lady, to show her there’s no way you’re out of her league. You want to crack a joke, make her laugh, or say something nice back about her (that is, if you knew anything about her to compliment besides how she writes).

After a few minutes of thinking, you settle on a stupid little way to sum up all those feelings. You draw a crappy-looking heart on the green circle and stick it on the middle of your locker, right below where she’d be sliding these letters. You keep the red sticker with the note though, just as a keepsake to add to the pile. You’ve never been the romantic type, but something about how old-fashioned this whole situation is, is turning you into a sap for love.

 _Love._ It just now hit you that she used that word in the letter. Does she really feel that strongly about you, or was she exaggerating? Maybe it was a figure of speech? You can’t be sure, but your heart still soars at the possibility, and you ride that high for the next few days.

On Monday, the green circle is mostly peeled off your locker except for the residue it left behind, and another note greets you inside.

I SAW THE GREEN DOT, THOUGH I HAVE NO CLUE WHY YOU’RE INVITING ME TO KEEP GOING WITH THIS DUMB SCHEME. I ALSO DON’T KNOW WHY I’M CONTINUING BUT HERE I AM. BTW… THERE WAS A HEART DRAWN ON THE STICKER I’M SURE YOU’VE SEEN IT’S YOUR ON DAMN LOCKER AFTER ALL. I DON’T KNOW WHO DREW IT. I DON’T KNOW WHAT IT MEANS IF IT WAS YOU THAT DID IT. IF YOU DID, WHAT THE FUCK DOES IT MEAN? AND WHY CAN’T YOU DRAW A HEART WELL? IT’S SUCH A SIMPLE SHAPE, STRIDER.

Your heart does a little flip since she hasn’t referred to you by name until now. You smile as you read it a few more times before class starts.

Over the next bunch of weeks, you keep getting notes every Monday and Thursday. They’re always there like clockwork, and they always bring a small smile and a bit of heat to your face. After the situation with the stickers, the notes start getting longer and more gushy. They mention your “soft-looking” hair, your “beautiful eyes” that you apparently should stop hiding, your “dumb sense of style that somehow always looks good” on you, your voice that supposedly sounds like it would be amazing if you ever sang. You start holding yourself differently every day in school knowing that someone is watching you and admiring different features of you, despite how creepy that sounds. You’ve never felt a weird sort of confidence like this before; most of your arrogance has just been for show until now.

It’s been months since the first letter, it’s now the beginning of spring.

Rose approaches you one day and hands you a small poster that looks like it’s freshly torn from a corkboard. It’s a flyer for the school theater’s production of Peter Pan which is performing in a few weeks. You raise an eyebrow at her.

“Do you… want to go to this?” you ask her. “It doesn’t seem your style. Unless you have a newfound love for fairy tales that don’t involve sexy sparkling vampires or old gay wizards for some reason.”

“No, Dave, I think this is the answer you’re looking for. I was talking to the theater director to see if he’d put on certain plays I think would benefit everybody, and one of the things he told me was that these students in the play meet up after school every Wednesday and Friday, and have been since October when the auditions were held.”

“None of that means anything to me. Are you saying I should join them, or…? I’m no actor, I-”

“Yes, I think you should branch out into theater arts for a new hobby,” Rose interrupts sarcastically. “Seriously though, are you not making the connection here?”

You think really hard, use all of your brain power to piece together these clues and try to understand what your sister is getting at here. After turning your gears for a bit, you give up. Rose sighs.

“You’re useless, no wonder you haven’t figured it out yet.” Rose starts to walk past you but presses the poster into your chest and makes one final remark as she passes by: “All I’m saying is, don’t you think that would be a perfect opportunity to, I don’t know, put something in someone’s locker without getting caught?”

Everything clicks into place suddenly, and your heart starts racing as you realize you now have a big lead on this person’s identity. Not only does it narrow down the search, but you now have a good opportunity to catch them or at least have a chance to talk to them.

 _Her_ , you remind yourself. _It’s fine if I’m trans but this isn’t a gay love story._ You wonder if you’d feel any different if your secret admirer wasn’t a girl. _Of course, wouldn’t I? I’d have to let them down easy._ You aren’t entirely convinced of that but damn you’ll pretend you are.

The Thursday after that you get what you hope will be the final letter.

SOMETIMES I CATCH YOU SMILING WHEN YOU READ THESE LETTERS. SOMETIMES THAT’S THE ONLY BIT OF SUNSHINE MY GLOOMY LIFE GETS ALL WEEK. I WONDER, IF WE EVER MET, IF I COULD STILL MAKE YOU SMILE. IT’S A NICE DREAM EVEN IF THAT’S ALL IT WILL BE.

Heh, talk about irony. You have your plan already in motion, and decide that tomorrow you’re going to make your move.


	2. If We Ever Met

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for making it to chapter 2! This chapter's quite dialogue-heavy, just a warning. It's real soft though and will probably knock the homosexual gambit a few notches in your favor ;P

Now it’s Friday. You find yourself nervous through each class even though you know you have no reason to be. You’re just gonna meet your secret admirer, no big deal.

When the final dismissal bell rings, you feel it reverberate in your soul. You gather your things with slightly shaky hands and make your way to your locker where you dump all the shit in. You take a deep breath and look around, making sure no one’s watching you. All this time someone’s watched you enough to know you smile when reading their letters, and yet you’ve never seen anyone looking at you in the mornings. It’d be kinda creepy if you weren’t so enamored by the expression of romance.

Feeling safe that no one is paying any attention to you, you walk a different route than the one you take to the bus. You instead walk to the auditorium where you see some kids filing in for rehearsal. You watch them all for a moment, looking from face to face wondering if any of them are the one who writes you the sappy letters. While you’d love to stay and watch the performance and maybe check out some of the other kids to try to narrow it down, it occurs to you that you aren’t sure at what point of the rehearsal your admirer drops off the note. So you head back to your locker and decide to wait there until it happens.

This ends up taking much longer than you thought. You spend most of the time leaning on the wall playing dumb games on your phone. It’s killing you not listening to music right now but you need to keep a close ear out for footsteps. Whenever a teacher comes by your heart stops as you first think it’s the person you’re waiting for, but then you just pretend you’re here to get a drink from the fountain and that you’re with the theater kids. None of the teachers recognize you or ask you any further questions, so you’re pretty safe.

After waiting for about an hour and a half, you start to wonder to yourself what you’ll do if the admirer never shows. Maybe you were wrong and she isn’t a theater kid, or maybe she’s sick today, or maybe you came on the one day she decided to break her streak. But your thoughts are disintegrated by the door at the end of the hall opening and a flurry of students’ voices comes from the other side. You gasp and press up against the side of the row of lockers yours is on and pray that you’re hidden enough. All you can do now is hear. Which is proving hard to do with your heart pounding in your ears.

The door shuts and the voices disappear with it. The only sound remaining is one set of footsteps coming closer to where you are. _It could just be a normal student coming this way for a totally unrelated reason. Or…_

And as that possibility comes to mind, the one where this is the person is the one you’ve been seeking out for months, the footsteps stop mere feet away from you.

Exactly in front of your locker.

You strain to hear.

You hear a piece of paper being handled and slipped into a metal slot, and its soft _thump_ into the locker.

This has to be it.

_Now’s the time._

You swallow hard and step out from the side of the lockers quickly, almost stumbling in your haste to kill the suspense, to see the girl you’ve-

_Oh._

Not a girl, then.

There’s a boy standing there who yelps loudly and jumps back with a loud _"Fuck!"_ as you emerge from your hiding spot. You vaguely recognize him from being in your grade and a few of your classes. He’s short, quite a bit shorter than you, but it fits him nicely. He has dark skin and unruly black hair that’s partially hidden underneath a gray beanie. He wears a dark red sweatshirt over a gray t-shirt, ripped jeans, and converse. In the split second of you looking him over you try with all your might to remember his name because you swear you’ve seen him more than just from existing in the same classrooms as you a few times.

“Karkat Vantas,” you breathe out as the name pops into your head. He used to bully your friend Jade in middle school, but in a it-means-he-likes-her sort of way. He’s always grumpy and yelling at something, but you’ve seen a softer side of him in English classes you’ve shared together. Though you didn't think he'd be soft enough to write love notes like _that_.

He’s breathing heavily and clutching his heart dramatically as he stares at you with wide eyes.

“Strider!” he shouts, before realizing he’s in an empty school hallway where he could get in trouble for being. He continues in a quieter yet just as angry voice, “What the everliving fuck are you doing here?!”

Your mind stumbles for an answer as you try to process that _this_ is the kid who’s been writing you love notes. He's someone who's barely talked to you outside of group projects where he just seems to hate your guts the whole time, someone who's always so mad you wouldn't have guessed he had a romantic bone in his body, someone who always speaks his mind without much of a filter but apparently also likes to hide being anonymity when it comes to romantic confessions. It's hard to believe that this is the one who's been pining over you for months.

“Were you...?” you start to ask, gesturing to your locker.

“No! What? I was just…” he searches for the right words, “Some douchebag told me to put a paper in this locker. That’s it. Now I’ve completed my side quest, so back to the boring main story.”

He starts walking past you, and as he gets closer you see the blush on his cheeks and damn he looks cute when he’s flustered and fuck you did not just think that right now. You quickly grab his arm, not knowing what else to do.

“Wait!” is all you can think to say.

Karkat looks down at your hand, then back up into your eyes with a scowl. He looks at you like you’ve personally offended him.

“What?”

You drop your hand shyly and shove it into your pocket.

“Want to take a walk?”

“What?” he says again, more confused this time.

“Like, if you’re not doing anything after your rehearsal is over. Actually if you're out of costume that might mean it already is? Anyways I figured we could go on a walk and… talk about.. things?”

Karkat rolls his eyes and starts walking again. You start walking beside him.

“First of all, I don't wear any costumes. I'm in tech crew, dumbass. But more importantly, what do we need to talk about?”

“Well we don’t _need_ to talk about anything, talking is just a thing some people do sometimes. Like look at us we’re talking now, we didn’t even need to talk about talking before we started doing it, how crazy is that? Wow, okay, now the word talk sounds weird to say. Talk talk talk. Shit’s wild. Doesn’t even taste like a word anymore.”

Karkat looks at you with an expression that reads “what the fuck?”

“Is talking ever a thing you stop doing?” he asks.

The two of you push open the front doors and start walking into the parking lot.

“Not really. So it’s either I keep talking to myself or you get a front row seat to my famous rambles.”

He hesitates, which you notice. You’re really hoping he hangs out with you, you’re so curious about him now that you can put a face and voice and name to all the notes you’ve gotten.

“Pass,” Karkat says, and starts walking to the right. You however want to go to the left where there’s a trail.

“Karkat,” you say, and it stops him in his tracks. “You wrote those notes, I know it.”

And you do. Sure he could be telling the truth about just doing it for someone else, but not only would that not make sense because no one would’ve known you were snooping around but also because the tone in the notes is extremely similar to how this dude talks. Plus, call it a gut feeling or maybe just some Taco Bell not agreeing with your system, but you know deep down inside that this is your guy.

Not, _your guy,_ like he’s _yours,_ but like, he’s the person you’ve been looking for, you know?

“I already told you, it was someone else,” he mumbles.

“Then who was it?”

“I don’t know! He… he wanted privacy anyways.”

“Uh-huh,” you say, crossing your arms. “Tell me one thing about this guy then.”

“He’s…” Karkat struggles trying to think of something.

“He’s you,” you say softly yet with confidence. You drop your arms to look less aggressive. “Dude, I just wanna talk about it. I’ve been dying to talk to the author of those notes for fucking ever, please don’t leave now. Just walk with me to the park, come on.”

The sincerity in your voice seems to catch Karkat off guard, and he hesitates. After a moment he turns around.

“Which park?”

And just from that one question, you know that’s a yes.

“The old one. I like the lake, plus there’s always too many little kids at the new one.”

Without another word, Karkat starts walking towards and then past you, now in the direction of the trail leading to the parks. You grant yourself a little “yes!” motion with your fist behind his back and walk quickly to catch up with the guy.

Karkat looks down at your feet.

“By the way, care to explain why the fuck your shoes clack on the ground when you walk?”

A smug smile spreads across your lips as you look Karkat in the eyes, dramatically lower your shades a bit and wink at him. He looks confused and a bit alarmed and you notice his cheeks darken again. Before he can ask anything else, you readjust your shades, take a few steps, and lift the toes of your shoes letting the wheels in the heels glide you a few feet in front of Karkat. From behind you hear a snort of amusement.

“Oh of fucking _course_ Dave Strider wears Heelys in the year 2020,” Karkat says, the last words gradually dissolving into laughter. You spin around expertly on the wheels and face him to see him doubled over, his laugh now a full cackle. You honestly didn’t think he’d be so amused by your dumb shoes but now you’re glad you remembered to put the wheels back in after your last class.

You roll back over to Karkat to see if he’s okay, but that just brings on another fit of laughter. His laugh is beautiful and contagious and before long you’re both just giggling like idiots at your shoes. He eventually settles down and so do you.

“I wanted Heelys so bad when I was a kid,” Karkat admits to you as you start walking again, “but they were expensive. Plus I don’t think I have the coordination or balance for them. I suck at roller skating and I’ve heard it’s similar.”

“Dude that can’t be further from the truth. Roller skating isn’t comparable because it’s near impossible to stop moving on those things, they’re all wheels. With these there’s so much control you literally stop just by putting your foot down. So you can’t really fall forward, just backwards. So just don't be an idiot by leaning back and you'll be fine.”

“Thanks for the tip. I’ll remember that when I get some. Oh wait, I’m an adult who doesn’t need fucking _Heelys_ as my footwear of choice.”

“Wrong yet again! Everyone needs them, they’re cool as shit.”

“Uh-huh,” he agrees sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

“Hey, what shoe size are you?” you blurt out.

“What?” Karkat asks. You ignore him and press the side of your shoe against his for comparison.

“Same size, fuck yeah. Let’s switch shoes, I’ll teach you to Heely.”

“What? No, fuck no. I’m not putting on those death traps.”

“Come on, do I look dead to you? I’ve never even fallen in these. Stumbled, sure, but my ass nor my face have ever hit the ground cause of these bad boys.”

“Okay first of all they’re not ‘bad boys’ they’re fucking sneakers with wheels in them. Secondly, you’re more agile than me, I’m sure I’d fall the second I stood up in those.”

“I’ll catch you,” you say without thinking. Karkat raises an eyebrow at you, and you panic as you feel your cheeks heat up. “I-I mean, I can hold onto you, or whatever, to make sure you’re steady. I’ve taught people to Heely before, it isn’t hard. I am the master and you are now my young grasshopper.”

“Aren’t I older than you by like 6 months, Dave?”

“What’s your point? Also, call me sensei.”

“Yeah not doing that. And not wearing your dumb shoes. There’s not even any room to try it here, this is a narrow bumpy path made of rocks.”

As his excuses change you know you’re winning and you'll be teaching him the ways of the wheeled shoe soon enough.

“The parking lot down there should be smoother ground,” you say, pointing at the park at the bottom of the hill.

“We’ll see. Don’t bet on it, though,” Karkat says, but you don’t listen to that.

On the rest of the short walk to the park you and him talk about a bunch of different things, none of them being topics anywhere near the secret notes. Your back-and-forth banter with him is amusing, and for once you have a conversation partner who can keep up with your wit. After a ton of your jokes being misses, one finally lands, and you see his mouth quirk up in a smile as he chuckles. You can’t explain the feeling you get in your chest when you see that, especially since you just made him die of laughter a few minutes prior, but you know there’s a strange presence of disappointment when Karkat notices you staring and ducks his head away from your gaze.

The two of you finally approach the park and reach the pavilion beside the playground.

“So you wanna chill in here or are you the kind of asshole who plays on the playset even though you’re a fucking adult?”

“Take a wild guess,” you say as you sprint towards the jungle gym.

You run around on the playground for a while, letting yourself just be silly and carefree for once. You’d call it irony if anyone asked but you always have genuine fun when fucking around on swings and slides and shit like that. Karkat just watches from the side, seeming unimpressed and occasionally yelling at you to get down. You make a point to ignore those commands.

At one point you’re hanging upside down from the monkey bars when your shades fall off your face. You squint in the sudden brightness and reach down for them, but alas they’re a few inches out of reach. You stretch your arm out as far as you can but it’s no use.

Footsteps approach from behind you and you watch in your upside-down view as Karkat bends down and picks up your sunglasses. He sits in front of you and examines the shades. You reach out for them but he just looks into the lenses, staying out of your reach.

“Give ‘em here, dude,” you say.

“You know, I should keep these on principle. Maybe wearing these all the time makes you into the douche you are.”

You groan, even though you know he doesn’t mean it.

“What? No, come on, not cool. Give me my shades. Pleeease? They're from my buddy John, they used to belong to the one and only Stiller.”

“Oh wow, I was wondering if the word 'please' was anywhere in your vocabulary,” Karkat teases. Then he takes pity on you and leans forward, slipping your glasses onto your face. It’s a little odd since you’re upside down and he ends up putting them on upside down, but you’re paying more attention to how his fingers graze your cheeks and how close his face is once your eyesight finally recovers and can focus in on him. Blood starts rushing to your head for multiple reasons, one of which being your brain nagging you with the image of the famed upside-down kiss from 2002’s classic _Spider-Man._

You swallow hard as Karkat hesitates, his hands still on the temples of your aviators. Then he clears his throat, drops his hands, and takes a step back. You have no idea what just happened.

“Let me teach you to Heely,” you offer as you swing yourself back up onto the bars. You jump down off of them and attempt to stand, but the blood draining from your head makes you feel dizzy and you start to fall over.

Safe, warm, strong arms are around you in an instant. Your face threatens to burn down the playground with its heat as you realize it’s _Karkat’s_ arms that are steadying you. Your vision returns - _when did that go away?_ \- and you see Karkat looking up at you with a concerned expression. His lips move, _stop looking at his lips,_ but you notice they’re forming your name. You decide somewhere in the back of your mind that you quite like that sight.

“I’m fine,” you try to laugh off casually. Only once he seems satisfied that you for sure aren’t about to pass out, Karkat lowers his hands.

“Yeah, no, I’m not letting a guy who can’t even stand up teach me how to skate around with wheeled shoes. Not happening.”

“Later then, once I’m not falling for you so hard,” you say. Then you realize what you said and promptly die of shame. You hate how words just tumble out of your mouth sometimes.

“What did you say?” Karkat asks, his voice breathy in disbelief.

“Nothing. When did I say anything? Probably more incoherent bullshit from an iron-deficient brain. C’mon, lets go to the lake and see if we can find any geese to harass.” And with that, you take off towards the water.

“Dave, we’re not going to assault any water fowl, you hear me?” Karkat calls after you as he hurries to keep up.

You eventually slow to a walk as you reach a bench that sits beside the lake. You look around, see no geese or ducks or any other wildlife to gawk at, and take a seat on the bench facing the lake with the edge of the table digging into your back. Karkat follows and sits next to you, leaving about two feet of space. It’s awkwardly noticeable.

There’s a rare moment of silence.

“Wow, I didn’t know it was possible for you to be quiet,” Karkat says, breaking it. “You look like you’re thinking about something though, as unbelievable as _that_ would also be.”

“Fuck you. Sometimes a guy just needs to think of how to phrase things,” you quip.

“I didn’t know you could do that either.”

You exhale a little forcefully through your nose as a lazy sort of laugh.

“Yeah, yeah. I just… actually care about not messing this up,” you respond, leaning forward and resting your elbows on your knees as you watch the light reflect off of the lake.

“Messing what up?” Karkat asks hesitantly.

“Whatever this is,” you say.

“Is this… something?” he asks. You aren’t sure how to answer, so you pause and just lean back on the table behind you.

“So, you like dudes, right?” you ask as if that’s the most casual question in the world. You know it comes out with forced coolness.

“Anybody cute, really,” he responds with a true casual tone. “And anybody who’s an asshole from the way the patterns seem to have been in the past. But yeah, gender doesn’t matter to me. What about you?”

“Oh, no, no, I don’t…” you trail off and look at Karkat. He’s looking at you expectantly with his big eyes. They’re so enchanting, he has these irises that look almost black except for right now in the sunlight where they’re pure golden. You look at the way his dark curls frame his face perfectly, all the freckles across his face and neck, how simply and objectively beautiful he is. You’re unsure of everything now. “I don’t know,” you finish with. _All I know is you’re damn attractive and I don’t know what to do about that._

“That’s fine too,” Karkat shrugs nonchalantly. You didn’t know such a simple statement could feel so relieving to hear.

“I know,” you say. Then you pause, and decide to dive right into the belly of the beast. “I gotta know, dude. Why did you say there wasn’t a chance I’d like you back?”

“When did I say that?”

“In one of your first notes.”

“Oh. Yeah. Those," he chuckles nervously, blushing. "Was kinda hoping you'd forgotten about that whole embarrassment."

"Not a chance," you say. "Well?"

He scrambles for words. “I-I don’t know. Well partially the whole ‘I’m a guy’ thing, but also just because I’m like, me? Loud, annoying, uninteresting, ugly-”

“Ugly? Are you serious?”

“Yes, Dave, ugly. As in I look like a fucking troll. Haven’t you noticed that by now?”

“Can’t say I have,” you let slip without thinking. You’re about to backtrack but you’re caught up in Karkat looking flustered again. He breaks eye contact and starts fidgeting with his fingers.

“Whatever. You probably can’t even see anything in those shades,” he says. You open your mouth to protest but he continues, so you just slip your shades off instead and squint in the light of the sun which is beginning its descent into the horizon. “My point is, if you have the next few hours free I can go ahead and list everything that makes me repulsive to be around let alone date.”

“If you’re so sure of that, why’d you begin the notes in the first place?”

“‘Cause I didn’t think you’d ever actually find out it was me, Dave! You think I would’ve written half that sappy romance bullshit if I knew I’d ever be confronted about it?” he shouts. You take a deep breath.

“Did you mean it, though? All the ‘sappy romance bullshit’?”

Karkat rakes his fingers through his hair and you watch his hands closely.

“Yeah, I did,” he admits. “I wouldn’t have written it if I didn’t.”

“Do you regret writing it?”

“I regret sending them in such a way that led you to finding me,” he laughs.

“I think you’re too hard on yourself.”

“Do you now?”

“Yeah, I do. Like maybe it’s cause you’re the first person to show any romantic interest in me since I came out but damn after spending a couple hours with you I think there’s plenty of likable parts of you, dude,” you say. The honesty of that statement scares you, so you try changing the subject a little. “Have you dated guys before?” Shit, you meant to switch to a non-romantic topic.

“No,” he scoffs. “The only person I’ve ever officially dated was Terezi Pyrope, you know her?”

“Hey, I dated her for a bit too, in sophomore year,” you laugh.

“Wait, sophomore year?” Karkat asks, thinking hard about it. “Wait, I think you were the douche she left me for! God dammit!” he yells. You start laughing and eventually he joins in too.

The two of you spend a few minutes reminiscing about your past romantic follies with your shared ex.

“But no,” Karkat eventually says, “to answer your question, I haven’t dated any boys. At Homecoming in freshman year I asked a guy to dance and got laughed at, so I decided I’d stop there.”

“Dude, what is with you and Homecoming that makes you fall for people?” you laugh. Then the gears start turning again and you’re hit with a sudden realization. “Wait, was it John? Egbert?”

Karkat sighs and looks embarrassed, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah…”

You burst out laughing again. “That was _you?!_ John wouldn’t stop talking about that for _months!_ ”

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up! Just like he did!”

Your laughing comes to a halt pretty quickly as you realize you’re probably really hurting his feelings.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. Just thought it was kinda funny how back then I would never have thought in a million years that you’d come back into my life in this way.”

Karkat rolls his eyes and slugs you gently in the shoulder.

“Whatever, you just like laughing at me.”

“Well that too, but more so the other thing.”

Karkat chuckles a bit at that and the two of you fall into silence again. The edge of the sun hits the horizon. You have no idea what time it is, and you couldn’t care less. You just want to be here, simply existing next to Karkat. You’ve never felt this way before, and it scares and excites you at the same time. You stand up and slip your aviators back onto your face.

“Where are you going now?” Karkat asks.

“To watch the sunset from the plastic castle. You coming with?” as you offer you hold out your hand in an ironically gentleman-like gesture before thinking about how you’re literally offering to hold this guy’s hand. You refuse to pussy out and rescind the offer though, so you leave your hand outstretched as a curious Karkat raises his eyebrow at it. He cautiously takes your hand and you pull him off the bench, but then you drop his hand as yours starts to sweat. You don’t know when you got so nervous or how this dude found your bashful setting in the first place.

The two of you walk quietly back to the playset and climb into the castle portion of it - you take the slide while Karkat climbs the little ladder. You crawl into the space that you’re now discovering is a very snug fit for two adults, then you swing your legs out the side so you can gaze out at the sun as the mountains on the horizon begin to claim it for the night.

For the first time in your life, you’re comfortable with the silence in the air. You always feel so pressured to fill each moment with words or rapping or beatboxing or music or some sort of noise, but right now you’re content with just some crickets chirping and some birds singing their goodnights.

You get a thought just then. You hesitate to even consider it to be a full idea at first. But after a moment you decide _fuck it_ and…

You gently take Karkat’s hand in yours.

He jumps a bit when you first touch him, like he didn’t expect it, but you avoid eye contact and just look at your hands as you lace your fingers together. You hear him exhale shakily as his warm hand squeezes yours gently, and you’re not sure exactly what that was meant to communicate but you smile anyway and squeeze back. Boy does this feel like cliche puppy love between two teenagers, but you’d be damned if you weren’t loving every second of it.

You feel Karkat’s gaze focused on you.

“Why did you do that?” Karkat asks in a tone barely above a whisper. You’ve never heard him so quiet. His voice is actually very soothing when it’s not yelling in its normal scratchy way.

“Do what?” you ask innocently, looking back at the sunset.

“Hold my hand, dumbass. Why?”

“Why are you asking about it?”

“Good question.”

There’s a pause.

“Want me to stop?” you ask hesitantly.

“No, no,” Karkat says quickly. He starts rubbing his thumb along the back of your hand and it feels really nice, though you’d be the last to admit that.

The sun disappears behinds the mountains and soon enough the first stars twinkle into the night sky. You take your shades off so you can see them better. You don’t have any particular fascination with space like the way your friend Jade does, but you can admire its simple yet complex beauty all the same.

“Why do you wear those?” Karkat asks quietly, as if not to break the spell everything seems to be under right now.

“Hm?”

“The shades. You almost never have them off.”

You turn and look right at him. Dark brown eyes lock onto bright red ones.

“‘Cause people think red eyes are either some demonic thing or are wild enough to do nothing but gawk at. I don’t like the attention.”

“Uh-huh, because no one pays attention to the guy wearing sunglasses inside, no not at all,” he says sarcastically. You roll your eyes. “Seriously, though, you have naturally red eyes?”

“Yeah? What are you colorblind or something? Holy shit, I can’t believe this whole time I thought-”

“No, dumbass. I just thought they were like, contacts or something.”

“Contacts?! You think I go through the trouble to make my eyes an unnatural color just to cover them with shades all day??”

“I don’t know, dude, that’s why I asked!” he loudly exclaims.

“If you weren’t so cute I’d find you unbearably stupid,” you recite. Karkat looks at you with wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

“I don’t know what’s harder to believe. The fact that you may have memorized at least one of my notes or the fact that you somehow find me cute.”

“Bro you’re fucking adorable,” you say without much forethought, “and yes of course I memorized your letters. They were the coolest thing that’s happened to me in my entire school career.”

“You’re joking.”

“Wish I was. School is fucking boring as hell man. You definitely made this year special,” you say shyly. You’re never this honest or outright with your feelings, what the fuck is this kid doing to you?

Karkat smiles at you, and when you say smile you don’t mean just with his mouth, like his whole face lights up in just pure happiness. You’ve never seen such a genuine positive emotion on his face before, and it makes your heart leap to know you caused it.

But, shit, now you find yourself in a _situation_ of sorts. You’re both looking at each other, faces only about a foot apart, smiling, magic in the air, something between the two of you…

Karkat’s phone rings just then, snapping the tension in half. As if you and Karkat were on either ends of a rubber band pulled taught, each of you daring the other to let go, then some douchebag comes up with scissors and cuts it in the middle so both of you feel the wrath of its snap.

The douchebag in question is apparently Karkat’s brother judging from the 1.5 sides of the conversation you can hear (the half being provided from the bits and pieces you overhear from the phone’s speaker). He urges Karkat to be home soon and help with dinner. Your mouth salivates at the thought of real food, but you say nothing about it. Karkat hangs up after a few minutes of heated debate. Karkat all but growls into the receiver as he hangs up.

Without putting much thought into it, you remove your hand from his and place it on his back where you rub in small circles. He seems to calm down almost immediately.

“You gotta go?” you ask, trying to keep any and all emotion from your voice, but you know a trained ear could still pick up the disappointment lacing your words.

“Yeah, eventually,” he says vaguely. “What about you, don’t you have somewhere to be by now?”

“Damn, you want to get rid of me that fast?” you put your hand over your heart dramatically in mock offense.

“We’ve been here for hours, Dave,” Karkat points out, though he also doesn’t make any move to leave just yet. “Besides, when was the last time you’ve eaten?”

“Lunch, obviously.”

Karkat’s eyes widen. “Dude what the fuck that was like 7 hours ago! You gotta get home and have dinner!” He scrambles out of the play castle and onto his feet, then reaches his hand down to you. You take it as you hoist yourself out of the tight space. When you get to your feet, the two of you pause for a moment, then descend the playset while keeping your hands together. It feels juvenile yet still gets your heart doing flips.

“There’s no real promise of dinner at my place anyways, dog,” you admit, trying to play it cool so he doesn’t blow it out of proportion like some people do. “So no worries on getting me home before the street lights turn on or whatever.”

Karkat stops and turns towards you. Shit, you shouldn’t have said anything.

“Are you serious right now? Is there really no food at your house?”

“Depends on the day,” you shrug. “Sometimes there is sometimes there isn’t. It’s really hit or miss. And I guess they never miss, huh?”

Karkat rolls his eyes, then looks you up and down. “Shut up. If there’s a chance you’d go without food tonight if I took you home, would you…” he hesitates. You wonder if he’s honestly asking what you think he’s asking. “Would you want to have dinner at my place? If that’s cool with you and your brother? I could also just buy you fast food or something, fuck, why did that thought come second? Wait, how are you even getting home? Last I heard you didn’t have a car, so how the hell were you planning on getting home tonight?”

You shrug. “I was gonna call my brother or something.” You make a point to ignore his other offers and questions.

“I mean, I could just take you if you want. And the offer is open for fast food or dinner at my place. I’ll warn you that my brother is a prick though, and my dad can be intimidating. I would also offer to just take you to an actual fucking restaurant, but my parents would kill me if I wasn’t home for dinner. It’s like a tradition for them or something. Typical nuclear family bullshit, you know?”

It’s certainly nothing you’d know about, but you nod anyway as if you do. You consider your options. You always hate taking handouts from anyone, but your rumbling stomach makes you hesitate on declining. Fast food sounds nice and it’s food and it’s fast, but this is a rare opportunity to have a true home-cooked meal.

You’re hesitant on that offer too, however, for one reason in particular.

“So you’re offering me a sort of date or meeting your folks already? Damn, Karkat, how fast do you want us to go?”

You watch amusedly as the heat creeps up his neck and onto his cheeks.

“I-I didn’t mean it like that! I just want you to eat, jeez! If you’re gonna be like that then fine I’ll just take you home.” He starts walking off but you tug on his hand so he stays in place with you.

“You know I’m joking man. Fine, I’ll take you up on the whole family deal, but obviously only so I can see how punchable your brother’s face must be if he talks like that. No other reason of course.”

Karkat smiles gently at you.

“Alright. Come on then. Whatever my mom made it’s getting cold by now.”

And with that, the two of you make your way back up the hill to the school and into the parking lot. One car remains parked and you both head towards it. You’ve spent the whole walk from the park figuring out how you want to phrase this and you make up your mind right before the two of you have to let go of each other to get into the car.

“Hey, Karkat?”

He stops and looks at you. “What, change your mind?”

“No no. I was just wondering, how are you going to introduce me to your family?”

“Uh, as Dave? Why, should I use another name…?” he asks curiously.

“Oh, no, that’s great, yeah just Dave is fine. But I mean, as a friend, or something else?” _Come on, Dave, you’re a rapper who can’t word shit like this elegantly?_

“Ohh. Uh,” Karkat takes a moment to think about this. He answers with a carefully-worded question: “What would you want to be?”

“Is this your way of asking me out?” spills out of your mouth before you can stop it.

“Would you say no if it was?” Karkat asks, and you hear the tinge of jokingness in his tone but not enough to coat the whole question in fiction.

“I’ve never been anyone’s boyfriend before,” you admit stupidly, the word ‘boyfriend’ feeling a bit foreign when used for yourself but the idea feels more euphoric by the second, “but I think it’d be pretty cash money to be yours.”

“Did you seriously just use ‘cash money’ in the same sentence as-”

You cut him off with a gentle kiss on his cheek right next to his lips. He shuts up real quick at the contact, then smiles at you mischievously.

“You missed, dumbass.”

Karkat then cups your cheek in your hand and presses his lips to yours in a chaste yet beautiful kiss. His lips are chapped but warm and tender regardless. This close to him he smells like pine trees and the scent of earth after a rainstorm. You take a mental snapshot of the moment so you can replay it over and over for the rest of your life. When the kiss ends and Karkat pulls back, you just look at him with a dazed expression and a slight smile. A laugh bubbles out of him.

"Damn, good to know that's an efficient way to shut you up. Guess I'll have to remember to do that more often if I ever want some peace and quiet, huh?"

You try with all your might to think of a clever comeback, but you're feeling a little lightheaded from the kiss, not unlike how you felt jumping off of the monkey bars earlier. But this time you're dizzy for a much better reason. So while you float up to cloud nine you just nod at your giggling boyfriend and climb into his car after him.

_Boyfriend._ You swish the term around in your head as one would a fine wine at a tasting. You decide you really really like it, for him and yourself.

Later that night you’ll wonder what that final note that he left for you says. That next Monday, as you meet your boyfriend at your locker before class, you find out and read it out loud to him just to see his cute embarrassed face scrunch up as you swoon over its contents.

THOUGHT ABOUT YOU A LOT AGAIN THIS WEEK. LIKE WHAT IT WOULD BE LIKE IF WE EVER MET. IT’S AN IMPOSSIBLE FANTASY, ESPECIALLY ONE WHERE YOU TOLERATE ME FOR MORE THAN A FULL FUCKING MINUTE. BUT IT’S STILL A THOUGHT THAT GETS ME THROUGH THE DAY SOMETIMES. MAYBE I’LL MAKE THIS NOTE A LITTLE MORE SCANDALOUS AND ADD THAT OCCASIONALLY I’LL EVEN IMAGINE H*LDING YOUR H*ND. OH NOW WE’RE GETTING RISQUE. GOD THIS SOUNDS DUMB, BUT I’M JUST A FOOL IN LOVE WITH NO FILTER. SO. YEAH.

THERE WAS A SYMBOL YOU MIGHT’VE PUT ON THAT GREEN STICKER ALL THOSE WEEKS AGO. I STILL DON’T KNOW IF THAT WAS YOU OR WHAT THAT MEANS, AND I KNOW I’LL NEVER FUCKING KNOW THE ANSWERS TO EITHER OF THOSE QUESTIONS. BUT WHATEVER IT MEANT, I CAN ONLY HOPE IT MEANS THE SAME AS MINE TO YOU. YOU TAKE UP WAY TOO MUCH SPACE IN MY HEART RENT FREE YOU DAMN SQUATTER. YOU HAVE SOME NERVE STEALING MY BREATH AND MY HEART AWAY. ASSHOLE.

LOVE YOU ANYWAYS, DAVE.

<3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so so much for reading, I hope you liked it, please drop a comment if you did! As always I'm @/KodaOfHeart on Twitter and I hope you have a wonderful day, dear reader! <3


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